1 Look, 3 Budgets: Let the Texture Do the Talking

Take one part log-splitting shirt jacket and one part sport coat, shake well, and you’ve got the wool chore coat: the winter layer you’ll reach for every single day. This one, in charcoal, has the lapels of the jacket you wear to meetings and the patch pockets of the one you wear to stack firewood. Wear it to a client lunch, a second date, or your in-laws’ house (the toughest room of the three) and you’ll look like you tried exactly the right amount.

The trick is texture. Count ’em: nubby wool up top, a soft gray henley under that, corduroy below, suede on your feet. That’s 4 fabrics and almost no color, which is how a guy wears head-to-toe neutrals without disappearing into the drywall. The henley does the heavy lifting. Its three-button placket gives you something to look at where a shirt collar would be, and it takes the starch out of the jacket. As for the cords, they’ve been paroled from your geography teacher’s closet. Go olive, keep the leg straight, and let them rumple.